A Boy of the Dominion Part 18

"Not that I advise it," said the cautious and knowing Peter. "You're over young yet to face the worries which must come to a landowner, and you could do with more capital. So you take the advice of one who's tried, and go as a labourer a bit longer. Meanwhile, you could put that 'ere money you've saved into something likely to make it grow whilst you're prospecting with Hank."

Joe had, in fact, saved quite a respectable amount, for it must be remembered that his personal expenses were extremely small, while his wages were good. Moreover, the dollar bills which Hurley had stolen from him had been recovered when that individual was captured, though the precious letter left him by his father seemed to have been lost for ever.

"It war a piece of luck, I do declare," said Peter. "Ef he'd gone off along the railway there would have been a different tale to tell. Joe aer fortunate to have come out of that mess with his life, and still more lucky to have got back his dollars. As to the letter, there ain't no saying if it war valuable. P'raps not; least, that's what I'm hoping. And now the thing's to invest his savings so as they'll grow while he's away prospecting. Seems to me, Hank, as ef this here place, as well as the settlement right up agin the railroad, might soon get big. The land's good for working. The crops this year has been first-cla.s.s, and some of our boys has won prizes for their wheat.

There's Jim, fer instance. His was nigh the heaviest yield per acre that there's been recorded, while the grain weighed mighty heavy to the bushel. In course the papers prints and publishes all these things, and people gets to know. There's been strangers hereabouts looking fer sections to take up come the summer. Wall?"

Hank was not the one to give an opinion offhand. He cogitated a great deal, and as a rule his faithful little pipe helped him considerably, or rather it appeared to help him, for it was his invariable custom to fill it on such occasions, set fire to the weed, and sit crouched into a ball, holding the pipe between two of his shapely fingers while he stared into the open. In this case there was no open, for they were seated in Mrs. Strike's parlour, and Hank had perforce to stare into the open stove, which is part and parcel of every settler's dwelling.

"Never did see such a man!" exclaimed Mrs. Strike impatiently. "He's all movement, you tell me, when he's off in the forest; but here, when you want his advice, he jest sits down and blinks, till you feel as ef you could shake him. I ain't got no patience with the man."

Peter grinned widely; he was accustomed to his wife's ways--and Joe also--knowing well that it was all playfulness on her part. As for Hank, the little man whom nothing daunted, as a rule, he pulled heavily at his pipe and looked as if he might take to his heels and run away.

He glanced askance at Mrs. Strike, till the good woman smiled at him.

"I'm only teasing you," she explained, with a laugh. "But, dear, dear!

you do amuse me. Seems to me as ef I shouted you'd be scared almost out of your life."

That set Hank grinning also--a nervous grin--then he became solemn, for matters which concerned the welfare of Joe needed the utmost attention.

"I'm with you, Peter," he said at last. "Down by the railroad things'll move soon. A few dollars laid out in town plots wouldn't come to harm, while ef we was both to apply for quarter sections right here, we could sell 'em at the break of winter to new settlers anxious not to be too far out. What about Hurley's, by the way?"

"That aer fer sale now," came the answer. "He didn't do much to it, and there don't seem no one wanting it just now, which are natural, seeing that winter's here. Come next spring it'll be asked for."

"Then there's Joe's chance. Ef he ain't got enough dollars, I'll chip in with him. Eh?"

"Ready and willing," agreed Joe. "I like the idea immensely. Hank and I are off into the woods prospecting, and we're not likely to want much cash. Seems to me it's a wise thing to put what I have where it may grow during my absence. I'll apply for a quarter section right here.

It's a condition of the Government that all settlers shall fence their sections in a given time, and break so much of the virgin ground. I can't do that now, as we have hard frosts, and things are too cold for working. In the spring, if I like to, I can tackle the job. If not, I can sell; then I'll buy Hurley's if I can, and sell that again also."

Buying and selling is the life and soul of Canada. Land speculators purchase from the Government with the sole idea of selling to those who follow, and see in the land for sale something with greater attractions than that offered free by the authorities. Again, men must fail in such a country, and here and there are always to be found those unfortunate enough to have to offer their sections, on which they may have expended much toil already. Whereas a quarter section of virgin land, extending to one hundred and sixty acres in all, may be of little value when unbroken, broken and fenced it is almost always of considerably enhanced value; for breaking and fencing mean the expenditure of labour, and labour is terribly hard to come by at times in the Dominion.

"We'll go along and see into the matter to-morrow, then," said Peter, when the question had been further discussed. "Jest throw on a log or two, Joe; it's cold enough to freeze one even inside the shack."

Those few days which followed gave our hero some idea, though not a complete one, it must be acknowledged, of the life of settlers in Canada during the long and severe winter which visits the land. There are those who dread the winter. One meets occasionally a man who has returned to England because of the Canadian winter, because of the inertia it brings to great stretches of the country, stopping all outside work, and, on the farms, cutting off neighbours from intercourse with one another. At other times it is the loneliness and silence of the life which send would-be settlers away; but not very often. There are scores and scores who put up with the winter as we in England put up with decidedly dispiriting weather, resting tranquilly and pa.s.sing the idle hours as best they can, knowing well that a glorious summer will surely follow.

"Not that there's fogs and suchlike," explained Peter, when telling Joe of the life. "Most days its beautifully sunny and bright, though the thermometer may be down below zero. And as to stayin' indoors all the while, that we don't. Most of us has knocked up runners, on which we put the rigs when we've stripped the wheels from 'em. Jim down below thar being a bachelor, with plenty to spend, and being also a good bit of a sportsman, has dogs, and his team drags him from shack to shack, specially round about Christmas. Even the school children get to school on their snowshoes. There ain't no difficulty about that neither, onless the weather's too altogether bad, for the Government build schools fer each settlement. There only wants to be a matter of seven children, and up goes a stone-built school, and a mistress who's properly trained for the job gets a lodging in the nearest shack, or in the school itself, and starts off to teach the youngsters. As to work, wall, I finds heaps. Winter's jest the time for papering the walls of the shack or fer doing a bit of painting. There's furniture wants making, and last winter I and the hand that stayed with us built a new stable. This time I'll whitewash all the outhouses, as well as the fowlhouse."

"And for me there's enough and to spare to keep me from being idle or from grumbling," interjected Mrs. Strike. "There's the house, in the first place, with the beds to make and sichlike. There's food to be cooked fer all, including the chickens, which have hot stuff every day through the winter. And ef I'm dull with looking at Peter there, I've only to go to the telephone and ring up Mrs. George Bailey. A real nice woman that, Joe. She's a help to her husband, she is, and that can't be said of every woman who's come out from England and has lived her life till then in a villa just outside London, with never any greater difficulty to provide for her family than that of stepping along the street to the nearest shop. If they was all like her, there's many settlers would be more successful."

It was clear that Peter and his wife could have kept on discussing this theme for an hour or more; and to those who knew them it was equally certain that these two worthy souls practised exactly as they preached.

They had faced the difficulties and the privations often met with in greater number by early settlers, and they had succeeded. Peter was a man who, thanks to hard work and a genial temperament, had made a success of his quarter section, so that the land which had lain bare for centuries before was now entirely tilled, and yielded handsomely to his efforts. In fact, from the position almost of a pauper, the man had advanced to a point where he earned a handsome income that was more than sufficient for his needs, and allowed him to put by many dollars during the course of a year.

"And it ain't finished there," he told Joe and Hank gleefully, when dilating on the subject. "There's the quarter section. It's worth a tidy heap of dollars--more'n a thousand pounds in English money--and that's what I could get any day of the year. But I don't stand still, not never."

"I've had my eyes around, and have gone in as a partner with a brother of mine who came out to Canada at the same time. We worked together for a while, then he went west into British Columbia. Wall, he took up fruit land when irrigation wasn't much more'n dreamed of and, with dollars I put to his, bought two sections close handy. They're gold mines. He's been able to get labour, and seeing that he has a large family of sons and daughters able to work and help, why, it's only needed honest work to tickle the soil and put in the trees to turn over a fine penny; the land does all the rest. It's that fertile it grows astonishing crops of apples, while peaches, strawberries, and sichlike do thundering well. Tom--that's my brother--was mighty wise and lucky too; he took up ground within easy reach of Vancouver, so that he always has a close market for his goods, putting aside the fact that it allowed him to watch things going on, and buy other bits of land when he thought they were likely to go up in value. That's where some of my dollars has gone. Me and the missus will be sellin' up one o' these fine days, and going west where it's warmer."

Joe was bound to admit that the cold did not trouble him. Not that the winter had as yet set in in full severity, though there had been heavy frosts and a fall of snow; but, as Peter had told him, he always found work to do. Even those few days before departing with Hank were strenuous ones. There were logs to saw for the stove, for the huge iron thing which warmed the shack, and which is essential to a Canadian winter, ate timber wholesale. Then there were the cattle to be tended to--for they required feeding, since they could not graze for themselves--there were the pigs also, while always water was wanted inside the shack, and must be drawn from the well which had been one of Peter's labours.

Of an evening, too, while the weather was so open, George and his brother, Jim and other neighbours would drive over, and there would be a jovial supper, followed by a dance, when Mrs. Strike bustled Joe tremendously, till the rough furniture was cleared aside and the boarded floor made ready for the dancers. Then it was Hank's turn, and sometimes Jim's, though Hank was the one who usually obliged. Seated cross-legged in a corner, his face as serious as if he had an army of Redskins after him, the curious and lovable little fellow would bend over his concertina and send forth such notes, that dancing became easy even to the most clumsy.

Those were jolly days. The jovial and friendly fellow who had come out from England had found not a set of desperadoes in the settlers of the Dominion, but men and women just as he had known at home, with only the difference which climate and environment necessarily bring. Hard workers, they liked Joe because he was like them in that, and because of his modesty. They liked him, too, because of his open admiration of the country of his adoption and the life he led.

"Ef they was all like you there never wouldn't be any squabbling," said Peter; "but Canadians is getting to understand the Britisher better.

He's coming out in greater numbers now, and sense he and we are the backbone of the country, why, we're fools if we ain't friends."

It was on a bright, clear, frosty morning that Hank and Joe climbed into Peter's rig and, with that worthy driving, set off for the nearest station. Mrs. Strike wiped her eyes as they went, for she was genuinely fond of them, while Tom shook Joe's hand as if he would wrench it off and hold it as a keepsake. An hour later they were aboard the train, and could see Peter driving back home to the settlement.

"Guess he's a good fellow, and deserves to succeed," said Hank, settling himself into a corner. "When next we see him it'll be spring or later hereabouts, and things will have changed wonderfully.

There'll be a pile of people here compared with what's settled now.

That's always the case; every year makes a huge difference. Shouldn't wonder if the plots you've bought didn't bring you in a small fortune; but of course it's a toss up."

Joe watched the surroundings as they pulled out of the station, noting the many shacks in the distance, and the fact that nearer the railway some of the older settlers had replaced their log dwellings by neatly-boarded houses. It was close to some of these that he himself, with the advice of Hank and Peter, had purchased certain portions of vacant ground in the hope that, as time pa.s.sed, a township might spring up, and thereby make his purchases more valuable. As to Hurley's quarter section, the winter being on them, it happened that there was no one who cared to purchase, and Joe had picked it up at a very modest figure.

"You jest forget all about them things and set yer mind to the expedition we're after," said Hank, after a while. "Fust we goes along to Sudbury, where we can buy all that we want; then we sets off for Fennick's. Guess we'll put in a week with him, and then strike off for the country we're after. Maybe we'll get a bit of huntin', and seems to me we should be wise, for a pelt or two will be useful for bedcovering. Of course you've got to be able to stand the cold, youngster. There's lots would think this job but madness. But a man can easy stand the winter ef he's in hard condition, and particularly ef he's in amongst the forests. As to bear, why, seeing as they hibernate, there ain't much chance of meeting the beasts, though it do happen sometimes that one of them gets disturbed, and then, ef he ain't too sleepy, jest you look out fer ructions. I don't know of any animal that's so tarnation dangerous as a bear, 'cept perhaps a caribou, and he's jest every bit as bad as, they tell me, is a rhinoceros. Ever hunted, lad?"

Joe was forced to admit that he had not. "Never had the chance," he answered. "Minding a cycle shop for Father didn't give one opportunities of going hunting, and besides, there isn't much to be had in England, not of the sort you mean."

Of a sudden, as they sped along in the train, his thoughts went back to the little township in which he had spent his boyhood, till the moment had arrived for him to emigrate. He could not help but contrast his condition here in Canada with what it had been there, and with what it might have been had he remained. Travel and the wide expanse of New Ontario lands had broadened Joe's mind, as it is bound to broaden the outlook that any traveller takes of the world. Joe was, in fact, beginning to realize that there is some truth in the statement that travel is one of the finest educations.

"In course it is," a.s.serted Hank, when he broached the subject, with the idea of starting up a conversation with the little hunter. "How could it fail to be? Don't I know the lives of them stay-at-homes.

They work hard, no doubt. They does their whack of toil that helps to make the earth turn round, as you might say, and keep things hummin'; but, 'cept for the papers and sichlike, they ain't got two ideas as to what other people's like, what they does with themselves, and how they lives. And there's more, too, ef I could tell you. Stay-at-homes is sometimes narrow-minded. Narrow-mindedness gives rise to suspicion, so that it follows that men who are ignorant of one another's affairs and of all that concerns 'em is often not too good friends. That's how it is with nations. One don't know the other, and suspects all sorts of things. Wall, see what's happenin'. The railways and the steamships and them motor cars has made a deal of difference. People move about a heap these days and see other people. So they get to understand 'em, and, understandin' them, they see as they ain't much different to themselves; also, they see that their intentions are just as friendly as their own. And what follows? Why, better understanding, and the way is paved to international friendships. Dear, how jawin' do tire a man! I'm on fer a smoke."

He shut up like the proverbial oyster, leaving Joe to go on immersed in his own particular brown study. He was wondering now what the Fennicks had been doing with themselves, for though he had had a few lines from them, he had had but the scantiest information; he had heard, in fact, that they had settled, and that was all. Whether they had been fortunate in finding exactly the cla.s.s of surroundings they desired, and whether the land they had chosen was rich, he had no idea. This he knew, they were a two-days' march from the railway, so that he and Hank had a long step before them.

"Guess we'll fill up at Sudbury," said Hank, after a while. "There's a gun wanted fer you, and ammunition for both of us. A shooter, too, ain't out of the way. We shall require warm clothing, too, though we'll trust to our shooting to get us pelts and make the most of those.

A kettle, a fry-pan, and a few sich trifles will fill our kit, and then we'll step it to the Fennicks'. Guess we ain't so far from Sudbury now."

They found all they required in the town to which they had booked on the railway, and laid out quite a number of dollars in buying necessaries for their journey; for Hank insisted that salt, sugar, coffee, and tea were as necessary to them as were bullets. Each bought three pairs of thick socks, as well as roughly-fashioned fur gloves.

The cooking equipment presented no difficulties, while neither bothered to buy extra boots.

"They'd load us up, that's all," said Hank; "besides, they ain't no use with snowshoes. You wait a bit till we're well away. We'll bag a few beasts that will give us skins, and then ef Hank can't make moccasins and caps and sichlike, why, all his eddication in the woods is lost.

We've got enough as it is to carry, and come the time we reaches up at Fennicks' we'll be sorry we brought so much."

"What about some sort of covering for the night?" asked Joe, who was as yet ignorant on such matters.

"Coverin'?" asked Hank, scratching his head.

"Yes; surely we shall need it. It'll be frightfully cold, that is, if the story I have heard is true."

"True enough, lad," agreed Hank; "only, yer see, you and I'll be movin'

every day, and exercise on snowshoes warms a man's blood. I know lots of young fellows who go off from their farms when snow's lyin'

everywhere and the thermometer is 'way down below zero; but their shirts is open in front jest as ef it war summer, while they ain't got no use fer gloves. We'll be much the same, while at night a lean-to--a double lean-to, you understand--made by driving two forked sticks into the snow and laying one across the forks, with others leaning up agin it, will give us a crib that couldn't be beaten fer warmth. I kin hear folks that stays at home always shiverin' talkin' of rheumatism; but there ain't nothing of that. A man who starts healthy through a Canadian winter can keep healthy. Of course there's blizzards, and nasty, dangerous things they are! I've laid in one of them lean-to shacks as I've mentioned fer a week together till the snow was piled deep over the top, and would ha' broken through ef I hadn't crawled out every few hours and beaten it down. Cold? It warn't! It war hot inside that 'ere crib. As fer lonely, wall, to some folks it might be, but to me and mates like me--no, not bit! There's always a gun wants cleaning; logs has to be broke and the fire kept going, and there's tea and sichlike to prepare; while in between a man's got his pipe, and can smoke and think. Thinkin' ain't bad fer a man, nor fer a woman, ef it comes to that. There's many a time 'way back in my life when I might ha' done different and better. Wall, then, rememberin' that aer good; it's a sort of eddication. Then there's friends that you've knowed and had high times with. Guess it's when a man gets stuck up in a blizzard, with only his pipe to smoke, that he gets thinking of his old pals, wondering what they're doing, where they are, and how the world aer going fer them generally."

"But what about frostbite?" asked Joe, for that was a bogy which had been presented to him in glaring colours.

Hank laughed, a silent little laugh which shook every inch of his frail body. "Them old woman's tales was invented to scare new folks out from home," he said. "There's frostbites and there's frostbites. I ain't saying that they don't exist, but a hunter don't often get 'em, unless he's held up somewheres and can't get cover. His blood runs strong and hot most times, and the frost don't touch him. But it's the man who ain't used to the cold, and who huddles up in a shack most of the day, that gets bitten. Ef he's sensible, or has sensible friends, it don't make much harm to him. Ef not, like as not he loses a toe or a finger, or maybe a foot, though it's rare, so far as I'm able to reckon. You ain't likely to get bit; a chap same as you, who's always on the hop, gets his blood runnin' all the time. Don't you give a thought to it, Joe."

Having stayed in the town sufficiently long to complete their equipment, Joe and Hank finally took the track for that part of the country in which the Fennicks had settled. The weather was still quite open, though cold. But the bracing air agreed wonderfully with them both, and though there was not the smallest need for haste, they stepped out strongly, sending the miles rapidly behind them. It was some distance outside the town that they came upon a party of travellers riding in, and recognized Mike, the policeman, as one of them.

"Hallo, Mike!" sang out Hank. "Been after more of them 'ere murderers?

How'd the case go with Hurley? This here Joe ha' been waitin' case he should be called for evidence; but he heard a while ago as he warn't likely to be wanted."